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Wii Gets Price Cut To $199
After watching Microsoft and Sony drop the prices on the Xbox 360 and the PS3, Nintendo has decided to jump in with a price cut as well. Starting September 27th, the Wii will cost $199 in North America, a $50 drop from the previous price. Japan will be getting a slightly smaller price cut, but Europe seems to be left out of this change. Nintendo is hoping this reduction and the release of New Super Mario Bros. Wii and Wii Fit Plus in the coming months will boost slipping sales rates.
I read just yesterday that the rumor is the Wii's replacement will bring it up to par with the Xbox 360 and the PS3. Given that both Microsoft and Sony want this generation to last much longer than your usual console generation, I'm thinking Nintendo will have an opportunity to put out two generations of their consoles in one of their competition's generations. If they manage to convince at least some of those casual players that bought the Wii to upgrade (perhaps through affordable blu-ray player or even more casual appealing games and hardware), they could easily stay ahead of Xbox 360 and PS3 in terms of consoles sold. Granted that was just a rumor, but I think it is a plausible one.
You could take a different viewpoint though. Look at XB360 and PS3: they're as much "media hubs" as they are game consoles. There was a whole addon built for the 360 specifically for the purpose of watching HDDVD movies - it has no gaming benefit whatsoever. I can log into Xbox Live and what am I greeted with? The option to purchase television shows and rent movies. And it connects up to my PC to act as a media center "extender" so I can watch video files and the like off of my PC.
Sure, the other systems have maintained more of a trend towards traditional console gaming with their games (and personally, I actually prefer that which is why the only system from this gen that I own is the 360), but it's hard to argue that Nintendo doesn't care about gaming - everything about the Wii is targetted towards gaming. It's just not the same type of gaming we are used to.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
You know, you could actually look up the software sales, instead of speculating. The Wii generally has more titles dominating the charts than the 360 or PS3... or looking at it another way, Wii+DS software usually outsells 360+PS3+PSP software. 3rd party software sales are similar to the 360's quantities, and exceeding the PS3's by quite a bit. That's with quite a bit more consoles sold, however, so the attach rate is closer to the PS3's. The 360 wins there.